The Self-Denial Required to Win the Lost (1 Corinthians Sermon 30)

Please take your Bibles and open to 1 Corinthians chapter 9. We’ll be looking this morning at verses 15-23. We will deal with verse 24 through 27 more next time.

This morning, we’re going to, in looking at these verses, sit at the feet of the greatest evangelist in church history, and we’re going to learn from him. What is a great evangelist? What makes someone a great evangelist? I have loved studying church history. It’s a joy and a pleasure of mine to read of the great men and women of God who have gone before us and have fought the good fight, finished the race, kept the faith, and who were active in sharing the gospel so that the gospel could make progress from that Upper Room in Jerusalem through Judea and Samaria and to the uttermost parts of the earth. And what a glorious, what an amazing journey that’s been as evangelist missionaries have taken the gospel and at great personal cost, have suffered so that others might hear and believe.

I. What Makes a Great Evangelist?

I love studying about great evangelists. One of the greatest evangelists, one of my favorite, I’ve a picture of him up on the wall of my office, is George Whitfield. In that picture, he’s up on a barrel and he’s preaching the gospel in a crowded market square, and there’s all kinds of chaos and mayhem going on around him, someone blowing a trumpet in his ear, other people yelling at him, others falling down clearly yielding to the message of the gospel. And this man did this for decades, preaching the gospel thousands of times to 10 million people in the colonial era before the American Revolution, crossed the Atlantic Ocean 13 times in a sailing vessel and preached to huge crowds. But he also made a commitment to personal evangelism, not just preaching in crowds, but personal evangelism. He said, “God forbid that I should travel one quarter of an hour with another person without talking to him about Christ.” I think about that every time I get on an airplane. God forbid that I should travel with this individual and not say something about Christ.

Or D. L. Moody, who lived later, at the end of the 19th century and early 20th century, one of the greatest evangelists, set up revival meetings all over, spoke to even more people, because the population of the world was greater. And his expanse, his travels were greater than George Whitfield’s, but D. L. Moody, a great evangelist. And he made a personal commitment to never go to bed everyday without sharing Christ with someone, talking to somebody about Christ. Many times he had forgotten. He was just about to go to sleep, and the Holy Spirit would wake him up and get him up out of bed, and he’d go out into the street and try to find somebody to share it with.

Another evangelist I knew very little about was a Chinese evangelist, named John Sung, who lived in the beginning of the 20th century, who was a brilliant man, who got multiple degrees in a short amount of time, but he was being schooled theologically at Union Theological Seminary, which at the time was theologically liberal and he had no clear proclamation of the Gospel. But at that point he was converted, an evangelist reached him, and he was converted to his sound faith in Christ and became ardent for the Gospel. So ardent that the people at Union Seminary locked him up, because they thought he had gone insane. And so, he was in prison or in somewhat of a lock-up, he did not have the freedom to leave, and he made the most of that time. He read in that brief period of time, read through the entire Bible over 40 times. God was preparing him for an incredibly fruitful ministry as an evangelist in China, and from 1927 until he died of tuberculosis in 1944, he preached the gospel in China and led over 200,000 Chinese people to faith in Christ.

Again, in our lifetime, Billy Graham, who died last year, probably spoke to more people in history face-to-face of the gospel of Jesus Christ. It’s hard to even measure how many people heard Billy Graham preach the Gospel and saw him preach face-to-face, not to mention those that saw him on television, or heard him on radio. It’s hard to even measure the impact. How many people he brought to Christ, that then brought other people to Christ? Would be, to some degree, a Billy Graham spiritual grandchildren, through that legacy. It’s impossible to measure.

All of these are great, great evangelists, but there are also some unsung heroes in the history of evangelism. John Bunyan is not one of those unsung heroes. He wrote Pilgrim’s Progress and many know about him. But we’ve been talking recently, Philip and I, he’s been reading about John Bunyan’s life, and how he was brought to faith in Christ and he was a tinker who went from house to house, to repair pots and pans and sharpen knives, and he was not a believer. But at that point he called himself a brisk talker in religion, and he was there in a kitchen and he overheard some women, three women who did not know he was listening, or anything about his spiritual condition, but they were, as some have said before, gossiping the Gospel. They spoke, Bunyan said, in Grace Abounding, his own personal testimony, “They spoke,” it said, “as if joy did make their heart speak, and they spoke of lofty things,” he said, “that I knew nothing about. Of the glory of God and the redemption of sinners, through faith in Jesus Christ.” These women didn’t even know they were evangelizing.

You never know who’s listening to you. Why spend the time complaining about the high price of eggs in the market, when you could be speaking about the glory of God and saving a sinner like you or like me. Because you just don’t know. And those women, who… Well, we don’t know their names even, but they could have no way of knowing what John Bunyan, who was overhearing them at the time, would go on to do, and how many people for centuries would be influenced by his ministry, through Pilgrim’s Progress.

All of those are great evangelists but I think all of them would say if asked, if they had the chance to ask, “How do you compare to the Apostle Paul?” They would have to say, “Honestly, I can’t even carry his shoes.” That the Apostle Paul really is the greatest evangelist that the church history has ever known. And so, we’re going to sit at his feet. But before we do, I winna just go through varieties of scriptures in the New Testament, and pull out some principles of what made the Apostle Paul a great evangelist, so that we can learn from him. Because I’ll tell you this, the elders of our church, the leaders of our church, spiritual leaders of our church, we yearn to see FBC come into a whole new level of faithfulness and evangelism.

As a matter of fact, I would have to say, I don’t want to be too bold or go beyond the elders, but I think they would agree that if there could be one radical transformation improvement in the life of the church, it would be in this. That we would see more and more people baptized here in the Triangle region as a result of the ministry of people in the church. And that’s our desire.

Let’s learn some principles, and then, we’ll look at the text that we’re looking at today.

First of all, the apostle Paul is a great evangelist because he had a message from heaven. He believed the gospel came from heaven and he heard it directly from heaven. It was not ministered to him or mediated to him by any man, so he was uniquely set apart to hear the gospel directly from God. Now, that gospel message, he is super clear about. He writes about it later in the book we’re studying. 1 Corinthians 15:3-4, he said, “For what I received, I also passed on to you, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures.” That’s the gospel. It came from the Scripture, from the Old Testament prophecies, and I received it and I passed it on to you.” Or, as he said earlier in this book, 1 Corinthians 2:2, “I resolved to know nothing while I was with you, except Jesus Christ and him crucified.” He was very clear about this message. This message is the power of God for the salvation of sinners all over the world, and he received it not as a word of man, but as it actually is, the word of God come from Heaven.

Secondly, he had compelling motives to evangelize. No chapter lays these motives out more plainly than 2 Corinthians 5, and I’m not going to walk through it, but in 2 Corinthians 5, he was very clear why he should be evangelizing. There are a lot of motives there, but there’s some clear motive that he had in 2 Corinthians 5:9-10, it says, “So we make it our goal to please Him, whether at home in the body or away from it. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one of us may receive what is due Him for the things done in the body, whether good or bad.” Putting that together, Paul’s motive for everything was to please Christ. “Everything I do, I want to please Him, and I know that some day I’m going to have to give an account for my life, for everything I’ve done in my body whether good or bad, I’m going to have to talk to Jesus about it.”

Thirdly, he had a divine calling to evangelism and the missions. He was called by Almighty God to this. On the road to Damascus, the Lord Jesus appeared to him in radiant glory while he was breathing out murderous threats and he was struck to the ground by the glory of the resurrected Christ, and he heard the voice from Heaven saying, “‘Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?’ ‘Who are you, Lord?’ Saul asked. ‘I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,’ he replied. ‘Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.'”

Now that… Keep that in mind because that’s going to be relevant to the way he phrases some things in the text we’re looking at today. I’ll just tell you what it is. He said, “I have no choice but to preach the Gospel.”

And he got that calling directly from God, through Christ, a heavenly calling. And so, Ananias who was sent to lay hands on him and heal his blindness and also who baptized him in water did not want to go. Ananias did not want to go. But God persuaded him and he said, “Go! This man is my chosen instrument to carry my name before the Gentiles and their kings and before the people of Israel. I will show him how much he must suffer for my name.” Divine calling.

Fourthly, great boldness. Paul was an effective evangelist because he was supernaturally bold. He just lived out that statement in the Psalms, “What can man do to me?” He just seemed to be completely supernaturally bold. He said, “I am not ashamed of the Gospel.” He prayed, he asked for prayer from the Ephesians that he would have boldness. He didn’t just lean on his own boldness tendencies or credentials or patterns, he asked that they would pray that he would be bold, but he was bold.

The consummation that was the very end of his life, as he was on trial for his life before the megalomaniac tyrant of the world, Caesar Nero, and he shared the Gospel with Nero. Wouldn’t you have loved to have been there to see that? “Nero, unless you repent, you will be condemned, but God sent His Son to deliver you from hell. All you need to do is trust in Him and you will be saved from your sins.” He says very plainly in 2 Timothy 4. Paul said that the Gospel was fully proclaimed in front of Caesar. And he was on trial for his life. That meant nothing to him. What matters is, this is the chance to preach the gospel to Caesar, probably the only one I’m going to get. And he did it alone.

Fifth, the power of the Holy Spirit. Paul was an effective evangelist because he relied every moment on the power of the Holy Spirit. He says in 1 Corinthians 2:4-5, “My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, polished rhetoric but with the demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on man’s wisdom but on God’s power.” Paul put the Holy Spirit on display every time he preached. And it wasn’t because he didn’t apparently seem afraid or… No, he was with them in weakness and fear and trembling, but the Holy Spirit used him and people were converted. That’s the power of the Holy Spirit.

Sixth, he had a clear strategy, he knew exactly how to go about his work. And what he would do, he had a slogan, but it was more than just a slogan, “To the Jew first. And also to the gentile.” What he would do is, in every community, by this time, the dispersion of the Jews all over the Greco-Roman world had happened. And for the most part, in every place where he would go, he would go first to the Jewish synagogue, and he would reason with the Jews based on the Old Testament Scriptures. And some of them would be persuaded and would join him as fellow laborers, and then he would go into the marketplace and reason day by day with the Greeks that happened to be there. He had a clear strategy, knew exactly what he was doing.

Seventh, he had an overwhelming love for people, he loved people. 2 Corinthians 5:14, “For the love of Christ compels us.” He was constrained. He was hemmed in by the love of Christ. And there are different ways of looking at the phrase, “love of Christ,” but I think we are safe in saying that the love that Christ has for lost sinners constrained Paul. And you see that very, very plainly in Paul’s attitude toward the Jews, who had yet to believe, the unbelieving Jews. In Romans 9, he said, “I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers.” Basically, “I’d be willing if I could, to trade my salvation for theirs.” That’s love for people.

If I can just… Could it be that we don’t evangelize as much as we should because we don’t love people as much as we should, that we don’t have a compelling love for people? And here’s the thing, if you don’t, just be honest about it to God and give it up to Him in prayer, and say, “I just don’t love lost people the way I should. Would you please change me? I pray that three years from now, five years from now, I would love lost people, evidently love them more than I do today.” That’s a spiritual beggar. But Paul had a love for lost people.

Eighth, he had a single-minded zeal, almost immeasurable zeal. It’s quite remarkable. He said to the Ephesian elders in Acts 20, “I consider my life worth nothing to me, if only I may finish the race and complete the task the Lord Jesus has given me, the task of testifying to the Gospel of God’s grace.” He knew what he was about, and his fire, his zeal, was like a fire burning inside of him. That’s just the way he was. And the Lord kept that fire burning. He had a zeal for this and you see it when he was stoned and left for dead outside of the city in Antioch, in the Book of Acts. And all the disciples gathered around him and he came up out of the stones. I don’t know if God raised him from the dead or he just got up. But he and Barnabas went that day to Derby and he preached in Derby the next day. I’d want a break, and I’m thinking everyone around me would think, “You need a break. Why don’t you go for a break, alright?” Paul just got up and kept preaching. There was an incredible zeal in his heart.

And the ninth, and this transitions into the text we’re going to look at today, he was willing to sacrifice personal preferences, the things he wanted to do with his life, the things he liked or didn’t like. He was willing to sacrifice all of that to win lost people. And so, that brings us to what we’re talking about today. He was willing to become all things to all people, so that by all possible means, he might save some.

II. Context: Love Limits Liberty

Now, let’s set this again in context. I always want to see the context here. Paul is addressing in 1 Corinthians 8-10, the problem that the Corinthians were having there in their pagan setting with meat sacrifice to idols. Chapter 8, verse 1, he says, “Now, about meat sacrifice to idols…” And you’re going to go on for three chapters about this. This is in a big setting, three chapters on the topic of meat sacrifice to idols. And Paul had preached the truth that there is only one God, the Creator of the ends of the earth, all the other gods of the nations are not Gods at all, the idols are nothing, they don’t represent any spiritual reality, they are nothing. And that meat is just meat. You can eat anything. Jesus had declared all foods clean. That’s the truth that he laid out. And some of the Corinthians had imbibed that truth, they understood it. Set free, they were able to do whatever they wanted with meat sacrifice to the idols there in the Pagan temples, and they were flaunting their freedoms in ways that were hurting weaker people who hadn’t reached that point of maturity yet.

And so, Paul is writing to them within the church, giving them the basic prints you are going to see again and again, and we’re going to use it again today. Love limits liberty. There’s a limit to our personal freedoms and our personal rights and what we get to do. We’re going to limit our liberties for the sake of other people. We’re going to think horizontally about how this will affect other people. And so, that’s where he’s at. And so, he uses himself as a personal example. And we saw the first person example last week, remember? He talks about how it is right for those who preach the Gospel to make their living from the Gospel. And he gives five reasons why churches should support their pastors, financially support them, and he lays all that out. I’m not going to walk through that again, but he has been very, very clear, multiple reasons why the churches that Paul had planted should step up and take responsibility to pay for those who preach the Gospel, pay financially.

But Paul is just setting that up, he actually isn’t really doing that for that main reason, to lay out reasons. And so, he says that in verse 15, look at it. He said, “But I have not used any of these rights.” “I didn’t use my freedom. I didn’t use my right to earn money in preaching the gospel, and I am not writing this now in the hope that you will do such things for me. That’s not why I’m writing these words. I’m giving you an illustration of the principle that I’m limiting my freedoms and my rights for your sake.” And so, he had voluntarily given this up.

Now, he established that the other apostles didn’t do this. And the other apostles were supported financially. Peter was. This was the common practice. This was the ordinary practice, but he did this voluntarily. He was under no compulsion here, it was just something he chose to do. He gave up the right to get money for preaching the Gospel. For him, it was a point of honor. You could look at it this way. He uses boasting language. Paul does this a lot, but he says, “This is my boast.” This is actually, if you could think of it this way, “This is the gift that I’m specially giving to Jesus in my ministry. I get to look at the people I’m preaching to, I get to look them in the eye and show very plainly, I am no religious huckster. I’m not in it for the money. There’s no fraud going on here. I don’t get any money for preaching the Gospel. I work hard with my own hands, late at night making tents to supply my needs and the needs of my companions, and none of you supported me. And this is what I’ve chosen to do. My preaching of the gospel is in a different category. I have no choice but to do that.” Look at his language, verse 16 and 17, “When I preach the Gospel, I cannot boast for I am compelled to preach. Woe to me if I do not preach the Gospel. If I preach voluntarily, I have a reward, but if not voluntarily, then I’m simply discharging the trust entrusted to me.”

Here’s how I understand those words. You could well imagine that Paul effectively heard from Jesus on the road to Damascus, “You are a dead man, but I’m not going to kill you. I’m going to use the rest of your life as I see fit. Do you understand?” “Yes, Lord.” “Now get up and go into the city and you’ll be told what you must do. You understand the words ‘must do’?” “Yes, Lord.” That lines up with his attitude here, he says, “Woe to me if I stop preaching.” Woe will happen to me. That’s a prophetic word of judgment. I will be prophetically judged by God if I stop preaching the gospel.

There’s some precedent here. Remember Jonah? Remember how God gave him a calling to be a prophet? How did he feel about that? Not thrilled. “I want you to go to your bitter national enemies, the Assyrians, and I want you to preach to them. Otherwise, I might destroy them.” He’s like, “I’m all in, Lord. Destroy them.” Don’t think for a minute Jonah was afraid to preach, he had stage fright or hated public speaking. It had nothing to do with that. And he wasn’t even afraid of what the Assyrians would do, I think he would have preferred they slaughtered him, rather than God save the Ninevites. What did he do? He ran. He did not preach.

You don’t run from God. “Where can I go from your spirit? Where can I flee from your presence?” If I go to the far side of the earth, you’re there. Well, Jonah tried to do it and God was there, and he actually didn’t even reach that far into the Mediterranean, but God sent a storm. God controlled a lot, he controlled the sailors, he controlled the big fish, he controls everything. And next thing there, Jonah is in downtown Nineveh preaching the message.

To all of the future would be prophets that God calls, do what he tells you to do. You have no choice. Or again, take Jeremiah. Jeremiah had a similar experience, Jeremiah was called into the hardest ministry there was in the Old Testament. I’ve thought about this, I think Jeremiah had the hardest ministry. “Jeremiah, I’m going to send you to a people, your own people, who will not listen to you. And when you’re done preaching, the Babylonians will come and destroy almost everyone.” Wow, what a message. And it was very unpopular, as God knew it would be. And so, in Jeremiah 20:7-9, Jeremiah says this, “O Lord, you deceived me and I was deceived.” Now, stop right there. You don’t say that to God. “Lord, you tricked me. You deceived me, getting me into this ministry. You overpowered me and prevailed. You’re stronger than I, what could I do? I am ridiculed all day long. Everyone mocks me and the word of the Lord has brought me insult and reproach all day long.” You would imagine then, it’s like, “I’m not preaching anymore. I’m not doing this.” And he tried, but listen to this, “But if I say ‘I will not mention him or speak anymore in his name,’ his word in my heart is like a fire, like a fire shut up in my bones. I am weary of holding it in. Indeed, I cannot.”

I think that’s somewhat like what Paul is saying, “I can’t stop preaching the gospel.” Paul is saying, effectively, “My boast in my service, O Lord, is not that. The Lord is powerful on me and I can’t stop, but this is something I have voluntarily, a free will offering I have offered to God, that I preach without charge. It’s just something I give.” Look at verse 18, “What then is my reward? Just this, that in preaching the Gospel, I may offer it free of charge and so, not make use of my rights in preaching it.”

The basic principle is love limits liberty. He was willing to limit his rights and privileges and freedoms for the sake of first: The church. Horizontally, the other believers. Now, we’re going to turn, and he said, “I also am doing it for the lost. I’ll limit my liberties and I’ll limit my freedoms for the sake of those who are not yet converted, for the lost.” And that’s what he’s talking about here. Paul enslaved himself to someone to win some to Christ.

In 1520, Martin Luther, based on this very text we’re looking at today, wrote one of his most famous treatises, and that is on the freedom of a Christian. And he had two basic premises. Listen to them, and I can unfold them from Luther, but there they’re just as powerful, and they come from this text. First of all, thesis number one: A Christian is a perfectly free, Lord of all, subject to none. Number two: A Christian is a perfectly dutiful slave subject to everyone. It’s really a fascinating argument, and he talks about the freedom of the gospel. And then, yet, to everyone else around, we are enslaved, voluntarily enslaved for their good. And that’s how Luther argues.

III. Paul Enslaved Himself to Everyone to Win Some to Christ

And that’s what Paul argues here, too. Look at verse 19, “Though I am free and belong to no one, I make myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible.” Paul is free, he’s saying, “I don’t owe anyone anything.” Even if he were imprisoned as he was again and again, his heart was free in Christ. The Son had set him free. He was truly free, free indeed. He was a free man. He was free from sin, he was free from death, he was free from human tribunals. He actually says in another place, “I care very little what any human tribunal says about me. Doesn’t matter to me what judgments you make. My conscience is captive to Christ.” He’s free, free, free. He’s a free man. He’s under no obligation to do anything, when it came to eating or drinking or clothing, what he did with his time, whether or not to get married, where to live, what things he enjoyed, that he was just a free man. But he voluntarily restricted those kinds of freedoms to win as many souls as possible to Christ, to gain them.

Now, he uses a business term here, like an accounting term. This is effectively the profit, talk about profits and losses. This is the profit to my business. Souls one, eternally one, for Christ. This is what I’m trying to gain in our business. Paul’s business was not tent making and he was trying to turn a profit. Paul’s business was the spreading of the Gospel and the gain, the profit he’s looking for, was lost people coming to faith in Christ, being rescued from the dominion of darkness. And so, this is yet another example of the principle we’ve been learning: Love limits liberty.

He begins talking about the Jews. Look at verse 20, “To the Jews, I became like a Jew to win the Jews. To those under the law, I became like one under the law, though I am not myself under the law.” He says this plainly in Romans 7 that we are not under law, but under grace. We’re set free from the ceremonial Law of Moses. We’re not under law. So as to win those under the law, Paul was raised, as we know, in the strictest sect of Judaism. He was a Pharisee of Pharisees. He knew the minutia of the Law of Moses very, very clearly. But he also understood that in Christ, the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility that the ceremonial law had set up, such as circumcision, the dietary regulations, kosher foods, the things that the Jewish men did with their beards and their hair, and their clothing, that they would not wear certain types of clothing with different fibers woven together. And all of those laws that the Lord said made the Jews a peculiar or special people, those things had been fulfilled in Jesus. The time for that was done, the Messiah had come. He’d been identified as a Jewish man, salvation had come from the Jews. We knew what that meant by these laws, but now they’ve been abolished, they’ve been fulfilled, they’re obsolete.

And so, Paul says, “Look, I’m not under that law anymore. I’m done with that. I can do whatever I want with my beard and my hair, whatever style hits me, alright? I can do it. I’m free, okay. I can wear any clothing I want within reason. Anyway, I can wear anything I want, anything that I would like to wear, I can wear it. I’m free. When it comes to food, I can eat what I choose to eat, anything. But if I’m trying to win some Jews, unbelieving Jews, to faith in the Messiah, I will put all of those freedoms aside to win them. When I go to their home, and they’re serving kosher, I will eat their food. If I’m having them over, I will serve kosher to them. Even though we’re set free from it, I’m going to fit into their world. If it’s a Sabbath, I’m going to follow the rituals of the Sabbath, even though the law, the ceremonial law has been fulfilled. We don’t have to do all those Jewish rituals anymore. I will fit into that Sabbath pattern, like I did when I was growing up. When I visit the synagogue, I’m going to follow the rules of the synagogue in there. I’m going to do the things they do.”

And this is the approach he consistently followed when seeking to reach the Jews. Just like in Acts 15 where the Jerusalem council decided that the converts, the gentile convert, did not need to become Jews to be saved, they didn’t have to be circumcised and required to obey the Law of Moses, but there were some regulations given to the gentile converts, so they would not offend the Jews, like, don’t eat meats with blood still in it and don’t need strangled animals, and other things like that. Well, you can eat anything, all foods are clean, but that’s especially offensive to Jews, so don’t do that.

And that’s why he also took Timothy and circumcised him. It’s a very interesting thing that he did, because he argues vigorously that you don’t have to be circumcised to be saved, and he wasn’t contradicting that. But Timothy had a Jewish mother and grandmother, but a gentile father who had never been circumcised. And so, he wanted Timothy to have a wide range of freedom of ministry and had him do that, so as not to offend the Jews, but not for salvation.

He also took a Nazarite vow, Paul did. And he followed all the Jewish regulations and paid for others to have the Nazirite vows fulfilled as well. That’s what he means. Now, this did not mean compromising any moral law. He not saying that. “Well, now, I can commit adultery as much as I want or I can murder as much.” No, those are timeless regulations the Holy Spirit fulfils in us. He’s talking about the ceremonial laws and personal preferences in terms of food, clothing, and lifestyle. That’s what he was talking about. And so, he became like a Jew to win the Jews.

Then, he turns it around. He says in verse 21 and 22, “To those not having the law, [that’s gentiles] I became like one not having the law, though I myself am not free from God’s law, but I’m under Christ’s law.” So as to win those not having the law. When he’s in the home of a gentile family, if they serve pork, he ate it. What if he hated it? What if he was like, “I hate pork.” Paul would say, “I don’t care.” Of himself, he said, “I don’t care whether I hate it or not, I’m going to eat it. I’m not bringing my own kosher lunch, alright. I’m going to eat whatever they serve without raising any questions about it. I’m just going to eat it.”

Remember how the apostle Peter was the forerunner in this? The apostle to the Jews, and God was getting him ready to go preach the Gospel to Cornelius, the gentile, the Roman. And so, he gave him a vision. Remember, he’s hungry and lunch was being prepared? God chooses his timing perfectly. He said, “Here’s a hungry man.” Alright, lunch is being made ready. But then there’s this vision of a sheet being let down from heaven, and it contained all kinds of four-footed animals and reptiles and birds, and there are all these unclean things. “Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.” He said, “Never, Lord. I’ve never eaten anything impure or unclean.” And then God spoke from heaven a second time, “Do not call anything unclean that God has made clean.”

The thing is, if they serve you snake… Never mind, but if they serve you [laughter] bat, eat whatever they serve you. A number of years ago, Elisabeth Elliot came to First Baptist Church and she spoke to the women at a women’s conference. And my wife and I and our kids, we had the privilege of sitting at a table with one of the greatest women of the 20th century, and we’re talking about missionary life among the Huaorani Indians in the Amazonian jungle and the things they ate. And you’ve heard this saying before, “Where he leads, I will follow. What he feeds, I will swallow.” It’s like…

I had my own battle with this before we went to Japan. Those of you who know me know some things about me, and concerning my tendencies. You are all put on notice that I don’t like seafood. If you have us over and you serve seafood to me, you are giving me a clear message. I don’t know what it is, I’ll have to ask you, but there’s definitely a message here. If my wife serves me seafood, that’s a whole different level of communication in our marriage. Absolutely. She knows I’m not going to eat it. I’m going to set it aside and say, “Okay, what did I do? It must have been huge. But we’re going to Japan. And they eat all manner of seafood over there. And we were at the International Learning Center, we were there and we were having a time of prayer before we all went to the four corners of the earth, some to Mongolia, some to sub-Saharan Africa. We were going to Japan.

And we were sharing prayer requests, some people were laying hands, some people were praying, and they were all different kinds of things being shared. Somebody’s father had a weak heart and that couple might never see that man again and they were crying. And there were some lighter things, more insignificant issues, all of it. For me, it was like, “I hate sea food. What am I going to do in Japan?” And people laid hands on me for that, and prayed that God would give me a special measure of grace. And sure enough, the first month we were there, the missionary I was working with and I went to help a Japanese man put a ceiling fan in and he brought us to a fine Japanese restaurant, and they brought out a fish on a cutting board,  and they looked at it, and it was like, nodded, went off. And the next thing I know, some of that was on my plate, uncooked, and I thought, just like Elisha, after Elijah had gone up to Heaven in a chariot of fire, I said, “Where now is the God of Israel?” And just, “Help me.” But the thing that’s cool about a sashimi is it has almost no flavor. And I actually liked the sauces we dipped in, so I was good for a couple of years on that one. But I don’t eat truck stops sashimi or sushi.

The point is, I didn’t have the freedom to just say, “I’m just not going to eat what they serve,” despite the fact that I am actually remarkably picky about certain things about eating but that’s just… You can’t do that. I became like a gentile to when the gentiles, Paul was saying. Verse 22, “To the weak, I became like a weak, to win the weak.” “I commended myself to them in whatever way I could. Again, we’re not talking about the moral law here, but I am talking about just preferences. I just tailored my preferences to them, and to what they wanted. I’ve become all things to all people so that by all possible means, I might save some. By all possible means, I might save some from condemnation. By all possible means, I might save some from eternity in conscious torment away from God, through the gospel. Whatever it takes, that I might fit in.”

Hudson Taylor in the 19th century was the first missionary there in China, to just completely go native, to wear a Chinese man’s garb and to have the long pony tail and all of the mannerisms and all of that. He was the first to do it. Most of the missionaries before the China Inland Mission were right on the coast, and they stayed Western and they stayed with that, but he plunged in and became all things to all people, so that he might save some. And that was what he found necessary.

A person who is selfish and cares only for his or her preferences in this world will not lead many people to Christ. There is a basic level of self-denial that we must reach if we’re going to be effective in evangelism. You just have to say no to yourself. You have to be willing consistently to say no to you.

Now, next time that we look at 1 Corinthians, verses 24 through 27, we’ll talk about the level of self-denial Paul uses, beating his body and making it his slave, the zeal that he had to keep himself under so that others could be saved.

IV. Applications

Applications: How does this text and the things we’ve talked about today challenge you? If you’re a believer in Christ, how does it challenge you toward evangelism? What does it have you do? How are you convicted? I’ve been convicted by this. What am I protecting? What am I keeping safe about my lifestyle so that I’m not as effective as an evangelist? It could be just how I think about my life, my time, my energy, my money, what I do with my days. I just… Am I thinking like I could lead some lost people to Christ with my time today or am I thinking selfishly about my time in this world? How are we… We’re surrounded every day by lost people here in the Raleigh-Durham area. It’s going to take sacrifice for us to reach them. We’re going to have to learn more and more, and I know it’s hard. Ben Edith, that’s one of the best prayers I heard, you took away a bunch of my application points, but thank you, brother, because we’re almost out of time.

The workplace, what could we do with the workplace? Like Ben was saying, what could we do to connect with people? To have conversations, to use hospitality to bring people over? What could we do in our neighborhoods? What could we do to connect with people? What could we do to either have people or go to their events. Sometimes, like recently, we had an event in our neighborhood that we didn’t host, but we just went. And building relationships. What are things we could do with existing ministries here in the life of the church, like International Connections, that’s having a phenomenal outreach to internationals?

What are some things we could do through the Caring Center, which has a phenomenal ministry here in this urban setting? What are some things we’re not doing now that we haven’t even thought of, some doors that God’s going to set before us to get us involved in the lives of lost people? What are some ways that we can, like Adoniram Judson did in one locality, I mentioned it before, spread 500 leaflets, and see one person come to Christ. Broadcast seed selling is one of the great challenges, to be willing to fail and fail and fail and fail, and you’ve not failed, because some of those people may come to Christ without you around. The Lord humbles us that way. But just to be willing to share with many people, so that some can be saved.

This is the gospel. Now, I’m conscious of the fact that not everyone listening to me right now is born again. You’ve heard the Gospel, all of you. And I pray that maybe you walked in here today, unconverted, but you won’t walk out unconverted. Judgment Day is coming, you don’t know when you’re going to die. And you’ve heard that God sent His Son into the world. You heard it from the three that were baptized. You’ve heard it from me already when Paul talked about what the gospel is. You know enough. You don’t need to do anything, you just need to believe and trust in Jesus and you will be forgiven. Close with me in prayer.

I.  What Made Paul a Great Evangelist?

What is a GREAT EVANGELIST? For years, I have turned to church history to help me answer that question

One of the greatest evangelists of all time was George Whitefield, a English man who lived in the colonial era—the first half of the 18th century—and who crossed the Atlantic Ocean thirteen times in a sailing vessel to preach the gospel both in America and in Great Britain, leading thousands of people to Christ… his relentlessness for the cause of the gospel is astonishing: a man whose voice was so powerful, Benjamin Franklin estimates that he was heard clearly by over 30,000 people—and that without the electronic amplification we are used to… this man preached over 18,000 sermons in his lifetime to over ten million people. He was truly a great evangelist.

Or D.L. Moody, the revivalist preacher of the 19th century, who made a commitment to the Lord to not go to bed every single day without having spoken to at least one person about the gospel; a man who organized gospel meetings in cities across the United States and Great Britain, who traveled over one million miles and preached the gospel of Christ to over 100 million people in his lifetime. He was truly a great evangelist.

Perhaps none of you have heard of the great Chinese evangelist, John Sung… a brilliant man who earned a Bachelor’s Degree, Master’s Degree and PhD in Chemistry, all in 5 years; who was immersed in liberal theology at Union Seminary that denied the bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ; but then John Sung was suddenly and radically converted to biblical faith and was so on fire for Jesus that the liberal school authorities concluded he had gone insane and locked him up in an insane asylum for 193 days… during that time, John Sung read through the entire Bible over 40 times and was prepared by God for his life as an evangelist… he was released from the asylum, returned to China in November of 1927 and began preaching boldly for Christ in the Min-Nan region… over the next seventeen years until his death from tuberculosis in 1944, it is estimated that he led over 200,000 Chinese people to faith in Christ. He was truly a great evangelist.

Or again in our lifetime, Billy Graham who died in February of 2018 at the age of 99… the greatest evangelist of the 20th century… a man who was heard in person by more than any other preacher of the gospel in the history of Christianity… over 215 million people in 185 different countries, not counting the hundreds of millions he reached through radio, television, and the books he wrote. He was truly a great evangelist.

George Whitefield, D.L. Moody, John Sung, Billy Graham… all of them were great evangelists… but I feel certain that all of them would say they did not come close to equaling the level of the greatest evangelist the Christian church has ever known… the Apostle Paul.

What made Paul such a great evangelist?

A.  Heavenly Message

1.  Without the accurate gospel of Jesus Christ, all evangelism is worthless

2.  Paul received the true gospel by a revelation from heaven, and never swerved from it

1 Corinthians 15:3-4 For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures

1 Corinthians 2:2 I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.

B.  Compelling Motive

2 Corinthians 5:9-10 So we make it our goal to please him, whether we are at home in the body or away from it. 10 For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad.

C.  Divine Calling (on the Road to Damascus)

Acts 9:6 get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.”

Acts 9:15 the Lord said to Ananias, “Go! This man is my chosen instrument to carry my name before the Gentiles and their kings and before the people of Israel.

D.  Great Boldness

Romans 1:16 I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes

Paul was astonishingly bold… even willing to preach to crazed mobs of people who wanted to see him dead.

E.  Power of the Holy Spirit

1 Corinthians 2:4-5 My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, 5 so that your faith might not rest on men’s wisdom, but on God’s power.

F.  Clear Strategy

Acts 17:17 he reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and the God-fearing Greeks, as well as in the marketplace day by day with those who happened to be there

1.  Every town, village or city he entered, he always went to the synagogue first to reason there with the Jews based on the Old Testament scriptures, proving that Jesus was the Messiah

2.  He would recruit fellow laborers among the Jews

3.  Then would reason in the marketplace day by day with the Gentiles who gathered there

G.  Love for People

2 Corinthians 5:14 For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died.

1.  He had an amazing love for the lost

2.  He considered himself IN DEBT to all lost people

Romans 1:14 I am obligated both to Greeks and non-Greeks, both to the wise and the foolish.

3.  He even said that he was filled with “great sorrow and unceasing anguish” for the lost among his people, the Jews… and was even willing to trade his salvation if it meant they would have eternal life

H.  Single-Minded Zeal

Acts 14:19-21 Then some Jews came from Antioch and Iconium and won the crowd over. They stoned Paul and dragged him outside the city, thinking he was dead. 20 But after the disciples had gathered around him, he got up and went back into the city. The next day he and Barnabas left for Derbe. 21 They preached the good news in that city and won a large number of disciples.

I.  Willingness to Sacrifice Everything to Win the Lost

1.  This brings us neatly to the very passage we’re studying this morning

2.  Paul was willing to “become all things to all people” in order to win some to Christ

3.  Nothing of all his life circumstances or personal freedoms—money, possessions, tastes, free time… nothing meant anything except insofar as it was useful for winning the lost

II.  Context: Love Limits Liberty

A.  1 Corinthians 8-10

1 Corinthians 8:1 Now about food sacrificed to idols…

1.  Some Corinthians Christians, rightly instructed about idols and the freedom we have to eat any food we want were FLAUNTING their freedoms and hurting weaker brothers and sisters as a result

2.  So Paul was making an extended case that the freedoms we have in Christ have a boundary… the LIMITS OF LOVE

3.  Be willing to forsake your freedoms for the sake of other Christians

1 Corinthians 8:9 Be careful, however, that the exercise of your freedom does not become a stumbling block to the weak.

B.  Paul’s Personal Example #1: The Right to Be Financially Supported through the Church

1.  1 Corinthians 9:1-14… Paul asserts multiple reasons why he had the right to be supported by the churches he planted… including the Corinthian church

2.  BUT… vs. 15-18 I HAVE NOT USED MY RIGHTS

1 Corinthians 9:15-16 But I have not used any of these rights. And I am not writing this in the hope that you will do such things for me.

a.  Paul had voluntarily given up his rights to financial support from the Gentile churches he was planting

b.  He did this VOLUNTARILY… it was by no means the custom, even among the other apostles

c.  And (vs. 15) he wasn’t trying to manipulate them to give him money… he wasn’t using guilt or tricking them by what he was writing

d.  FAR FROM IT! This was a point of HONOR for him, like a pledge he had made to the Lord

e.  It made it very obvious that he was not some religious HUCKSTER using people’s religious desires as a platform to fleece them and become wealthy

3.  Paul was COMPELLED to preach… he had no choice

1 Corinthians 9:16-17 Yet when I preach the gospel, I cannot boast, for I am compelled to preach. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel! 17 If I preach voluntarily, I have a reward; if not voluntarily, I am simply discharging the trust committed to me.

a.  Paul knew that the Lord Jesus could have killed him on the Road to Damascus

b.  He knew that his life was forfeit forever to the overpowering will of Christ

c.  “Woe to me if I don’t preach the gospel” = the Lord will hunt me down, and force me or kill me… I have no power to say no to Jesus Christ

d.  Remember Jonah… who tried to evade God’s call on his life to preach to Nineveh? God hunted him down and used his sovereign control over the wind and waves and the sailors and the giant fish to force him to do exactly what God wanted him to do

e.  Remember Jeremiah… who was called by God to preach messages to a people who would HATE him and reject all his words… Jeremiah wanted to resign, to stop preaching… he said God had tricked him

Jeremiah 20:7-9 O LORD, you deceived; me, and I was deceived you overpowered me and prevailed. I am ridiculed all day long; everyone mocks me… the word of the LORD has brought me insult and reproach all day long. 9 But if I say, “I will not mention him or speak any more in his name,” his word is in my heart like a fire, a fire shut up in my bones. I am weary of holding it in; indeed, I cannot.

4.  So, Paul was saying “My boast in my service is not that I preach at all… I have no choice but to preach. But my true boast in my service to the Lord is that I offer the gospel FREE OF CHARGE… I do NOT use my rights and my liberties”

1 Corinthians 9:18 What then is my reward? Just this: that in preaching the gospel I may offer it free of charge, and so not make use of my rights in preaching it.

Paul was able to look skeptical Gentiles in the eye and say “I’m NOT in this for the money!

C.  This is the Basic Principle: Love Limits Liberty

Paul was willing to limit his rights and privileges and freedoms for the sake of 1) the church—his brothers and sisters in Christ; 2) the LOST… to win them to Christ

Martin Luther, 1520, “On the Freedom of the Christian” Two basic propositions:

A Christian is a perfectly free lord of all, subject to none.

A Christian is a perfectly dutiful servant of all, subject to all.

D.  Paul made himself a slave to everyone for the sake of winning them to Christ

III.  Paul Enslaved Himself to Everyone to Win Some to Christ

A.  Basic Assertion

1 Corinthians 9:19 Though I am free and belong to no man, I make myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible.

1.  Paul is free… he doesn’t owe anybody anything

2.  Even if he were imprisoned, as he was again and again, his heart was free in Christ… free from sin, free from death, free from the ceremonial law of Moses, free from fear… FREE FREE FREE

3.  Paul was under no obligation to do anything when it came to eating, drinking, clothing, what he did with his time, whether or not to get married, where to live, what he enjoyed… he was a FREE MAN

4.  BUT he voluntarily restricted his freedoms to win as many souls as possible to Christ

B.  “Gain” = business term, like profit vs loss

1.  Paul’s “business” was not making a financial profit through his tentmaking or even through religion

2.  The “profit” from Paul’s relentless pursuit was SOULS

3.  Winning a lost soul from Satan’s dark kingdom… gaining those precious souls for eternity

Colossians 1:13 For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves

4.  Whatever he could do with his personal life to win lost people

5.  This is yet another example of the basic principle: LOVE LIMITS LIBERTY

C.  Becoming Like a Jew to Win the Jews

1 Corinthians 9:20 To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law (though I myself am not under the law), so as to win those under the law.

1.  Paul was raised under the strictest sect of Judaism… he has been “a Pharisee of Pharisees”; he understood the minutiae of the Law

2.  He knew that the death of Christ had destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of regulations in the Law of Moses… circumcision, the dietary laws, the Sabbath regulations, the dress codes, what they did with their hair and beards to mark them out as God’s peculiar people

3.  All of those ceremonial regulations were now FULFILLED in Christ and ABOLISHED… they were obsolete!

4.  So Paul said “I myself am not under the Law”… I can eat pork, I don’t have to obey the priestly regulations about the Sabbath, I can trim the corners of my beard and the hair on my head… all those Jewish regulations are DONE… I’m a FREE MAN…

5.  BUT… when I want to win some Jews to Christ, I voluntarily give up my freedoms so as not to offend the Jews

a.  I keep kosher with my eating; I will eat only those things a Pharisee would eat

b.  I follow the Sabbath patterns… I regard one day as sacred with the same rituals I had when I was growing up

c.  When I visit the synagogue, I follow all the patterns and habits and rituals so as not to offend them

6.  This was the approach he consistently followed when seeking to reach the Jews

a.  Like the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15 decreed that Gentile converts did not need to be circumcised and obey the Laws of Moses in order to be saved, BUT so as not to give offense to the Jews, they were asked to not eat meat with blood in it, or to drink blood, or to eat meat polluted in ritual idol sacrifices

b.  The reason was so as not to offend the Jews

c.  That is why Paul circumcised Timothy… a young man with a Jewish mother but with a Gentile father; he’d never been circumcised, and Paul wanted to avoid offending Jews—NOT teaching a false gospel that Timothy HAD to be circumcised in order to be saved

d.  That’s also why Paul took a Jewish vow—the Nazirite vow—and let his hair grow for a time, and paid for some others to have their vows fulfilled (Acts 21)

7.  BUT this does NOT mean compromising on any moral law… first and foremost, the gospel of Christ crucified…

1 Corinthians 1:23 we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews

a.  Paul would NEVER compromise on that!

b.  Nor would Paul violate his conscience on any other moral issue… and he would not teach FALSE DOCTRINE concerning these matters… Paul would speak his freedoms when the time came; but he would RESTRICT his freedoms in his actions to win as many Jews as possible to faith in Christ

D.  Becoming Like a Gentile to Win the Gentiles

1 Corinthians 9:21-22 To those not having the law I became like one not having the law (though I am not free from God’s law but am under Christ’s law), so as to win those not having the law.

1.  By the same token, Paul turned around and behaved quite differently when he was at the home of a Gentile family

2.  If they served pork, he would eat it… he would not refuse

3.  You may ask, “What if he HATED it? What if it was REPULSIVE to him?”

a.  Remember the Apostle Peter had a vision of a sheet lowered from heaven

Acts 10:12-15 It contained all kinds of four-footed animals, as well as reptiles of the earth and birds of the air. 13 Then a voice told him, “Get up, Peter. Kill and eat.” 14 “Surely not, Lord!” Peter replied. “I have never eaten anything impure or unclean.” 15 The voice spoke to him a second time, “Do not call anything impure that God has made clean.”

b.  So missionaries taking the gospel to distant lands are frequently given foods to eat that they would never choose for themselves

I remember having dinner with Elizabeth Elliot, who lived among the Huaroni Indians in the Amazonian Jungle, and she ate the most repulsive traditional foods…

She said “Where he leads, I will follow; what he feeds, I will swallow!”

4.  Paul was “not free, but was under Christ’s Law”

a.  So again, he was not a LAWLESS person, free from the moral law of God

b.  Also, he was not free to refuse food that people were serving him just because he didn’t like it

c.  He submitted to the work of the mission and ate whatever they served him… he acted like there was no Sabbath if they were working that day; he fit into Gentile patterns of life

E.  The Weak

1 Corinthians 9:22 To the weak I became weak, to win the weak.

1.  This is the very point he’s been making

2.  If someone would be offended by what he did or didn’t do, he would ACCOMMODATE HIS FREEDOMS TO THEIR TASTES

F.  Overall Principle

1 Corinthians 9:22-23 I have become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some. 23 I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings.

1.  Becoming “all things to all people” is the calling of the gospel

2.  It is the call of love… to turn your back on your preferences, your pleasures, your desires, your scruples, your tastes… and fit in with the people you’re trying to reach

Hudson Taylor: as a missionary, he was the first to “go native,” to wear Chinese clothing, to shave his head and wear the traditional pony tail, to look no different whatsoever from a native Chinese man…

“I become all things to all people so that by all possible means I might save some”

3.  WHY? To share in the blessings of the gospel

1 Corinthians 9:23 I do all this for the sake of the gospel, that I may share in its blessings.

This is what Paul felt was necessary to have a full harvest among both Jews and Gentiles

A person who is selfish and cares only for their own pleasures will not win many people to Christ

There is a level of self-sacrifice that is ESSENTIAL to winning souls for Christ

IV.  Self-Discipline for the Sake of the Gospel

1 Corinthians 9:24-27 Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. 25 Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last; but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. 26 Therefore I do not run like a man running aimlessly; I do not fight like a man beating the air. 27 No, I beat my body and make it my slave so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize.

V.  Applications

A.  How Does this Text Challenge You in Evangelism?

1.  Paul was willing to sacrifice anything other than the truth to win souls for Christ

2.  He was willing to go back to the strictest patterns of Judaism and live according to them in order to win Jews to Christ

3.  He was willing to eat foods he didn’t like, follow rituals and customs he hadn’t grown up with, learn patterns of behavior that were alien to him to win Gentiles to Christ

4.  What about you? Each of us has to ask this of ourselves… I think we PROTECT ourselves from the cost of evangelism… we KNOW it’s going to mean sacrifices of time, energy, money… and

5.  The question that searches each of us from this text, What of our freedoms and preferences are you willing to sacrifice to be an instrument in the hands of God to lead lost people to Christ?

6.  We are surrounded every single day here in the Raleigh-Durham area with unchurched people, lost people… to reach them we must step outside of our comfort zone

a.  Workplace: what patterns would you have to change at work to win some people to Christ? Could it be some new conversations, new ways of engaging people in spiritual conversations? Could it be meeting a felt need? Perhaps visiting a sick co-worker in the hospital? Or helping someone with some project at their home?

b.  Neighborhood: what patterns would you have to change to get to know your neighbors better? Could it be hospitality? Asking some neighbors over for dinner?

c.  Downtown Durham or Raleigh or Chapel Hill: frequenting coffee shops and restaurants and boutiques and engaging the owners or workers in spiritual conversations

7.  Perhaps an ongoing ministry… PSS, working with them in crisis pregnancies and using that as a platform for sharing the gospel with the lost; prison ministry… Durham Rescue Mission

8.  Perhaps volunteering with our own ministries… like International Connections or the Caring Center

B.  Mission Trips

1.  Perhaps God may use this chapter to challenge you to go on a short-term mission trip… to go to

C.  Service Projects: Disaster relief… Baptist Men or Baptist Global Relief

D.  Bottom Line: on Judgment Day, our Lord will speak to us about what we did to seek and save the lost; this chapter shows us that we cannot be instruments in winning some to Christ without being willing to give up some freedoms, some privileges, some preferences

1.  Many of us are TOO BUSY with our lives, too bust with family activities, with our kids’ sports or music or our own agendas

2.  1 Corinthians 9 challenges us to get out of our self-focused bubble and win lost people to Christ

E.  A Direct Appeal to the Lost RIGHT NOW…